ATLANTA — The president of the Atlanta Federation of Teachers said she felt "deja vu and anger" and calls teacher vulnerability the "elephant in the classroom" after a video emerged of a violent assault at Douglass High School.
"Things are out of hand, they've been out of hand for a while," Verdaillia Turner says.
The video shows the moment a fight broke out on Monday, which resulted in a teacher being hurt.
A student now faces assault charges after allegedly attacking the teacher, who officials said was trying to break up a fight.
According to Atlanta Public Schools, the Douglass High School student went to the teacher's classroom to confront another student and began fighting. The teacher jumped in to try and break up the fight, but that's when APS said the student turned on the teacher.
The video obtained by 11Alive shows a portion of the fight.
That teacher and others, according to Turner, are being left out to dry when confronted with such situations.
"I asked this teacher, that has been in the school district now four years, 'What's the recent training you've had on physical altercations?'" she said. "He said 'zero, none.'"
The union president believes community leaders and policymakers are avoiding directly addressing teacher safety and empowering teachers to maintain authority in the classroom.
"It's an every day occurrence somewhere in this state, because students don't have to have respect for authority, and many of their parents don't have respect for authority either," Turner said. "We can throw all kind of money at the schools, but it's not going to work unless we take care of the basic foundation - and that's respect for authority, readiness to learn."
"When they come to school and they respect teachers and they are ready to learn, then teaching can take place," she added. "And we'll be a better, calmer, gentler society."
Turner said she wants to see teachers' unions be heard with more respect and policies be tailored to ensure their safety.
She said teachers face an unbelievably difficult environment, illustrated by the video that's gone viral.
"I was angry the minute I saw it. First thing I thought - if that teacher had a gun, that would be a dead child," she said. "That's why we are not advocating for guns. That's exactly what I thought."
"Because until you are hit in the face and knocked down and every day you're on edge ... until you are in that position, don't pass judgment. And we've been in it too many times," she added.
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